People have been asking me to write a point by point takedown and breakdown of Kaladesh since Friday, and I just can’t. I can’t knowingly trash something that so many people I deeply respect spent so much time working on. But at the same time, I can’t take any enjoyment from this set either. Every time i see art from it, i become sad.

I hate being negative. It sucks, and it’s not my normal way of being. But still, I owe it to myself to explain what I feel and why, so that hopefully folks can learn and grow, and the next time make it better.

And let me be crystal clear- I hold nothing against the R&D team at wotc, or the Creative team. I’ve got nothing but the deepest respect and admiration for them, and many are my friends. This was a misstep, but I have full faith that they will learn and grow too, so that the next time will be different.

If you’ve read the Silmarillion, you know who Fëanor was. If you don’t, Fëanor was the dickhead who created the Silmarils: three indescribably beautiful and magical jewels that contained the light and essence of the world before it became flawed. They were the catatlyst for basically every important thing that happened in the First Age of Middle Earth.

It is thought that the inspiration for the Silmarils came to Fëanor from the sight of Galadriel’s shining, silver-gold hair.

He begged her three times for single strand of her beautiful hair. And every time, Galadriel refused him. Even when she was young, Galadriel’s ability to see into other’s hearts was very strong, and she knew that Fëanor was filled with nothing but fire and greed.

Fast forward to the end of the Third Age.

Gimli, visiting Lorien, is also struck by Galadriel’s beauty. During the scene where she’s passing out her parting gifts to the Fellowship, Galadriel stops empty-handed in front of Gimli, because she doesn’t know what to offer a Dwarf. Gimli tells her: no gold, no treasure… just a single strand of hair to remember her beauty by.

She gives him three. Three.

And this is why Gimli gets to be an Elf Friend, people. Because Galadriel looks at him and thinks he deserves what she refused the greatest Elf who ever lived—- and then twice* that. And because he has no idea of the significance of what she’s just given him, but he’s going to treasure it the rest of his life anyway.

Just look at that smile on Legolas’s face in the last panel. He gets it. He knows the backstory. And I’m pretty sure this is the moment he reconsiders whether Elves and Dwarves can’t be friends after all.

Your next campaign begins with the PCs in the middle of a dwarven beer-tasting festivals. Dwarves from across the land have arrived to take part in a week-long extravaganza where a highly prestigious panel of judges and expert beer critics taste the stocks of all the different dwarven breweries, ranking them based on stuff like color, taste, texture and stuff like that. Also, for the layman there’s a lot of cheap beer.

During the course of the week, something goes horribly wrong: maybe one of the judges gets murdered, or there are suspicions of one of the judges being a plant for one of the breweries skewing the scores to their favor, but shit is about to go down. Your players need to navigate a mystery while surrounded on all sides by cantankerous drunken dwarves.

Also, if you have any dwarves in your group (especially dwarves with proficiency in brewing) use this as an opportunity to let them inject bits of dwarven beer trivia into your campaign.

What do you think middle earth would be like if it had a 21st century level of technology, and how do you think it would affect the quest? Because all I can picture when I think of it is the dwarves roaring around on these huge Harley Davidsons while Bible putters along behind them on a little moped, or awkwardly stuffed into a sidecar or having to share with someone and he's terrified because cars are much safer you know why is this necessary OH YAVANNA SLOW DOWN

Oohh god ohgodohgod OH MAN

sorry i want a coherent well thought out response but my mind is stuck in

Gearhead dwarves ruling the auto world and constantly coming up with BETTER more EFFICIENT safe fuels (solar panels on a mountain, electric run cars with huge geothermal/solar/wind powered electric grids to charge them in) weaving runes and ancient symbols of their history in their clothes and rides. They guard their secrets well and everyone knows the only downside of getting a dwarvish made machine is only a dwarf can fix it if anything goes wrong.

(Dwarves and Elves still have kings and probably still are WAY into their lineages. Men have either full presidents or, in Gondor’s case, a Prime Minister and Parliament set up with the Monarchy in the background. The men are kind of confused as to why elves and dwarves still do the lineage rule and confused as to how they make it work so well, but ancient traditions die hard with ancient races.)

Thorin and co THE BIKER GANG. LEATHER JACKETS WITH RAVEN WINGS AND “SONS OF DURIN” ON THE BACK (Thorin of course has a FAB fur lined leather coat). Going to retake their ancient city built over centuries within a mountain, still taken by a dragon with a hide no bullets can pierce. After the fall of Erebor worked as construction workers or whatever other labor jobs were needed before founding the new city of Ered Luin.

Technogeek elves who have eternity to solve coding problems and make communication gadgets that look like fine elegant jewelry. They take power from the sun and no one knows how they use the tree roots to pass information but its a forest of living networks travelling through the roots of Arda. They chart the stars ans try to understand the worlds beyond in hopes of traveling it and wear clothes that combine smart, modern cuts with flowing ancient robes. Techno elves weaving their magic into their computers and not letting anyone know their secrets (but theyre really annoyed at having to admit the dwarves are better at large scale energy production.)

Humans blowing them all away with ingenuity and the fact that they live with races who live for eons means the short lived people pay a BIT more attention to the impact of what they do. Humans who suddenly got WAYYYYY advanced on medical science because they have way more reason to with their short lives. And yeah elvish medicine is very nice but not all of us can stand over someone and mutter some Quenya and everything so scoot back I have an antibiotic for that ok? (elves are very thrown off by this. There’s probably a small internal culture war with the elven healers between those going to learn from human doctors so they can combine the ancient elvish medicine with modern human ones, and the ones who stubbornly hold onto their ways.)

HOBBITS who are…PROBABLY NOT THAT DIFFERENT. They still work mainly with the earth and keep to themsleves. They have better farm equipment and the tools for even MORE COMFORTABLE hobbit holes but nothing fancy. Bilbo the writer of TV scripts and radio dramas living comfortable on inheritance before he’s pulled into the adventure he’d only written about.

Bilbo in a GODDAMN SWEATERVEST AND BOWTIE with a helmet too big for him shoved over hIS HEAD. at first they gave him a moped but after two days of him puttering along in terror with the echoes of “oohhhno oh dear oh dear” trailing behind the company, he got shoved into a sidecar.

Later he gets his own leather jacket and sure it looks a bit silly over his sweatervest and tie and nice trousers but he still feels a bit of a rush of unhobbity pride when he wears it.

Oh boy it’s been an AMAZING weekend and i apologize in advance for the grammar and any spelling mistakes that this post will include (i am so ver y tired)

okay so first of all, the actors have been incredibly kind and it was all in all just a great atmosphere! Not a single actor was rude or made stupid comments or something. I kinda feel like they don’t fully realize how much the people idolize them, which is really cute i think!

there were sooo many great things and highlights of my weekend, so i will definitelly forget something while typing this down! but anyway…

Graham McTavish in a kilt!!!!! (boy he has nice legs)

Luke Evans singing like 10 times oh my god my heart melted

the disco in the evenings!! the people there were so funny and drunk lmao but they were still polite and there was no groping or stalking of the actors

also i high fived john callen at the bar during a party

adam browns audition story!!!! omfg he is so fucking funny

sylvester mccoy??? the man is just a highlight for himself!! his panels were hilarious, he was walking through the audience the entire time

PORNOBALKEN (r,i,p)

seeing all the drunk and hung over actors omg you dont know how hilarious it was

mark hadlow cAN SING SO WELL HOLY SHIET

the costume contest!!!!!!!!!! jesus christ there were so INCREDIBLY DETAILED COSPLAYS omg i loved all of them

MARRIAGE PROPOSAL

possibly 5 hour extended edition of botfa (REST IN FUCKING PIECES ME)

21 EXTRA SCENES I MEAN COME ON

we’ll get to see more of batteling dwarves and how Bifur lost the axe in his head!!!!!

John Bell is the cutest okay protect this boy at all cost

also my photo with Graham McTavish omg he smells nice and hes HUUUGE

HOBBITCON 4 CONFIRMED

OKAY THATS IT I FORGOT SO MUCH STUFF BUT IDK anYmORE AND I nEED TO GO TO SLEEP OKaY ILU TAKE CARE